Data from: Particle-associated bacterioplankton communities across the Red Sea

Pelagic particle-associated bacterioplankton play crucial roles in marine
ecosystems, influencing biogeochemical cycling and ecosystem functioning.
However, their diversity, composition, and dynamics remain poorly
understood, particularly in unique environments such as the Red Sea. In
this study, we employed eDNA metabarcoding to comprehensively characterise
bacterioplankton communities associated with pelagic particles in a
three-dimensional assessment spanning depths from the surface to up to
2300 m along the full length of the eastern Red Sea within the exclusive
economic zone of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Our results reveal a diverse
assemblage of taxa, with Proteobacteria, Cyanobacteria and Planktomycetota
being the dominant phyla. We identified pronounced spatial variability in
community composition among five major Red Sea geographical regions with a
third of all amplicon sequence variants being unique to the Southern Red
Sea in contrast to a very homogenous distribution along the water column
depth gradient. Our findings contribute to a deeper understanding of
microbial ecology in the Red Sea and provide valuable insights into the
factors governing pelagic particle-associated bacterioplankton communities
in this basin.